Today I spill a lil on the curb for the late, great Vincent Price, who died exactly 14 years ago on October 25th, 1993. A truly great and most unique American actor, Price will be forever remembered for his distinctive voice and the semi-serious/semi-comedic roles he played in countless horror films. He will also be remembered to some for such things as hosting the PBS television series Mystery! in the 1980's and for adding the ghostly voice-over at the beginning of Michael Jackson's "Thriller."

Vincent Leonard Pricewas 82 years of age when he died of complications from emphysema and Parkinson's disease. He was still active up to within a few years of his death; one of his last major film roles was a part in the movie Edward Scissorhands. That last film of his, which saw him in a smaller role due to his ill health, was in 1990 and capped an extremely long, illustrious, and most prolific film career. It began for the actor in 1938 and included well over a hundred films -- many available on DVD atAmoeba Music. Two of my personal favorite Vincent Price films are House of Wax (1953) and Theatre of Blood (1973) -- the latter being the very first film of his I ever saw and the one that got me hooked on his ever-engaging on-screen persona. The film is pure, brilliant horror and suspense with just the perfect balance of humor -- the sort of film that makes most of today's over-the-top on special effects but low on anything else so-called "horror" flicks pale in comparison.

In Theatre of Blood, Price plays British stage actor Edward Kendall Sheridan Lionheart who has illusions of grandeur about himself being some great Shakespearean actor -- which he is not. Rather, he is a poor actor with a bitter soul who seeks out revenge against all of the critics who have lambasted him throughout his career. In the gore-fest that ensues he diligently schemes, with the help of his daughter Edwina (played beautifully by Diana Rigg of The Avengers UK TV show fame), to creatively murder these arch rivals (as he sees them through his evil eyes) one-by-one -- inspired by the deaths of characters in Shakespeare's plays. He also obsessively knocks off each of his seven victims in relation to each of the Seven Deadly Sins -- no doubt something that later inspired the film Seven. He re-enacts The Merchant of Venicescene in which Shylock gets his pound of flesh -- only it is the critic's live heart that the Vincent Price character coldly removes in Theatre of Blood. But the plotted murder from the movie that will forever be stuck in my mind is the one carried out in the theme of Shakespeare's gore-ridden tragedy Titus Andronicus, in which the Vincent Price character tricks his victim into eating his own beloved two poodle dogs which have been baked into a pie (eeew! I know)! The victim, a person of girth, who chokes to death on the pie, represents gluttony out of the Seven Deadly Sins.

I was reminded of Vincent Price while listening to London's wonderful ResonanceFM which recently rebroadcasted a great interview with the passionate actor (circa 1990) in which he talked of his love for not just film but also for the stage and especially for radio theater, noting how decades ago radio plays were such a vital form of entertainment.

Vincent Price leaves behind a huge legacy. Below, courtesy of the lists posted on websites including amazon and wikiipedia, is the long list of Vincent Price's films.